I have come to believe that the love of Christ is irresistible, yet incomprehensible at the same time.  Grand and glorious, it calls us away from the sludge of life to joy unspeakable, peace beyond understanding, life beyond dreams, purpose greater than ourselves.  It is a love that never fails and never ends.  Who wouldn’t want that?  Like blind men groping in the dark, we seek to be loved.  And no matter how great a relationship in our life may be, inconsistency runs through it.  The skill of humanity to love well falls short, way short and we keep groping in the dark.  We don’t feel loved.  We don’t love ourselves.  We can’t find love.  But should our eyes ever be opened to a God who would love us enough to dress Himself in human skin for the sole purpose of taking the just sentence of betrayal, abandonment, loneliness, mutilation, humiliation, and death so we don’t have to.  I can’t even get anyone to help me on the side of the road when I run out of gas, much less suffer and die just because they love me that much.  Who can resist that?

Yet, despite the love of God through Christ has been made known through the Scriptures for thousands of years, the world seems to resist.  

I read just yesterday that Islam is growing more quickly than Christianity in the world right now.  Allah seems to be attracting more than Christ.  How is that possible?!?!  The word ‘Islam’ means ‘submission.’  While we were yet sinners the Bible says, God gave Himself to die for us.  Allah only blesses Muslims after they repent.  Love is withheld until repentance comes.  But Christ loved and died for everyone, not just those who repent.  Repentance is how we accept the gift of His sacrifice, but His sacrifice has already been given to every human being.  Like a Christmas present never opened, the love of God has been wrapped with a bow and nametag that matches every human soul.  Kindness comes before we have done anything to deserve it.  How can a god that gives little until earned even compare to the God who gave the whole of His heart to a people that could never earn it and weren’t even trying.  Yet, people miss it.

It seems to be plain what Jesus did on the cross.  And if not, once a person hears what God has done and they believe it, how is it that His love never really gets planted in their heart?  If God’s love were full entrenched in someone’s heart, the groping in the dark would stop.  They would have received more love than they would ever need.  Striving to please every Tom, Dick, and Harry in their life to be approved of, appreciated, loved would be a needless endeavor in the light of God’s love.  So why?  Why?  Why do souls continue to resist what is categorically irresistible?  Well, here is the answer:

Ephesians 3:14-19

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. (ESV)

This is the Apostle Paul explaining that supernatural strength from God is required to understand the love of God.  To know the story of what Christ did on the cross is not enough.  Power is required.  

To know the 1939 Daimler-Benz T80 could travel 393mph would never be enough to fully grasp what that meant.  To comprehend, you would have to climb behind the steering wheel, hit the gas pedal and feel the power of travelling almost 400mph.  The story of Christ is fantastic and we must all tell the story often without apology.  But for a person to know that God loves them is not enough for the to fully understand what that means.  They need power beyond themselves to experience it.  Where does this power come from?

Jesus said this:

John 15:12-13

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. (ESV)

God is love and love is the power of God.  People have to experience it to grasp it.  Once experienced truly, the irresistible nature of this love will satiate our empty soul and continually overflow our hearts.  This is one reason why Jesus came.  For people to know the irresistible love of God, they first need to comprehend it, experience it.  Jesus loved those around Him then commanded them to do the same.  This is our command-to love others as Christ loves us.

If you have succumbed to the beauty of God’s unending love for you, love others the way He has loved you-sacrificially.  Then and then only will they feel the power of God’s love surging through their veins.  They will finally experience spiritually what they only knew intellectually, the breadth and length, the height and depth of a love that is truly irresistible.

Leave me a comment.  Do you live your life as someone who has truly experienced the love of God?

Live Blessed and Be a Blessing!

PS: Be sure to subscribe and I will send you “10 Principles for Living in God’s Abundant Plan for Your Life.”